Archivist of the U.S.: What happens to social media records?

When President Franklin Roosevelt established the National Archives as part of the Executive Branch in 1934, he couldn’t have imagined its future leader would be blogging. But that’s exactly what the new Archivist of the United States, David Ferriero, started doing recently.

Ferriero was confirmed as 10th Archivist of the United States on November 6, 2009. I talked to him last month.

I just read your post on AUTUS: Collector in Chief. So does this mean the Archivist of the United States is blogging?

Yes. The plan is to use the National Archives and Records Administration’s Open Government Plan as the template. So I’ll post on each of the areas and get input.

In the first post you say that without records “we risk losing our memory as a country” and that the concern about this is “deeply American.” Can you explain this?

We have forever, in terms of my understanding of history, been grappling with the creation and preservation of records. When Robert Connor, the very first archivist of the United States [1934-1941], was saddled with this responsibility, he discovered to his horror the amount of records that had been destroyed, burned, not kept. I’ve used that as an analogy as to where we are around electronic records, to insure that in this environment we’re preserving records from the beginning. I’m talking about records in their various formats–of great concern is the social media records that are created. Everyone understands that email creates a record, but I’m not sure the same can be said for social media records.

How do you educate people and agencies about the issue of social media records?

One of the pillars of our Open Government Plan is to educate all the federal agencies to bring together the technology folks and the record management folks. There’s an opportunity to educate the tech folks to think about the records implications from the very beginning. I had breakfast last week with Vivek Kundra, the White House Chief Information Officer, and we’re going to convene the first ever meeting between the Chief Information Officers Council and the Records Management Council.

You’re about six months into this job. What’s the biggest challenge been?

Finding my way around the 44 facilities. Getting to know my 3,000 employees. Getting my head around the whole electronic records environment.

What’s your goal for digitizing the Archives’ collection?

If I had my way, all 10 billion things would be available electronically 24 hours a day. I don’t think I’ll live to see that. I think we need to beef up our own digitization activities. The Foundation [for the National Archives] helps us with special projects, so I’d look to them to support some of the private partnerships.

You previously served as the Andrew W. Mellon Director of the New York Public Libraries. How would you compare the culture there to that at the Archives?

In lots of ways I think they’re similar. I think New York was good preparation for Washington. The New York Public Library is a public-private organization, and we have a similar situation here–with the White House and Congress, which I liken to the mayor and city council in New York; and we also work with a private foundation.

The Archives is home to the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution and the Bill of Rights, among many other important documents. What’s your favorite?

Every day I’m finding new things. There’s the letter I wrote to John F. Kennedy in 1960 asking him about information for the proposed Peace Corps, which was presented to me in February by Tom Putnam, the director of the Kennedy Presidential Library. That triggered a search at other presidential libraries, and before long, I heard from the Eisenhower Library—I wrote him one letter in 1956 and one in 1960. And then LBJ came through, finding my letter complimenting him on passing the Civil Rights Act. I have no memory of any one of those letters.

What document would you like to have at the Archives that’s not there?

We’re very lucky to have on deposit David Rubenstein’s copy of the Magna Carta. It would be nice to have that as a part of our permanent collection.

As individuals, there are only a few documents that we’re supposed to keep forever. How do you decide what’s worth keeping at the Archives?

Among the 250 agencies of the federal government, about 2 to 3 percent of these records are deemed worthy of being held here in perpetuity. It’s a schedule worked out with each of the agencies that identifies those records with enough historical value to be permanently preserved.

Over the decades, documents are created on various types of paper. What kinds of paper preserve the best?

Parchment is still holding up pretty well after all these years. Early paper was good. And then 1800 when wood pulp was introduced–not so good. There was some work done in the ‘70s to create acid-free paper. By and large we’re in good shape with paper. I’m more concerned with content in digital form right now. We haven’t had enough experience with it to understand how it behaves over time and the process of migrating between systems. In 100 years I want people to be able to have the same experience with electronic media as they do today.

Are you a collector and record-keeper? One of these people—like me—who has all your report cards from grade school filed away?

I do have all that stuff. I have my confirmation certificate, and I have the family histories on both sides of my family, back to the 1700s. The folks here in the Archives have been helping me augment the collection. I think they can stop now.

Anything surprising?

Great uncle Tony who kept coming into the country illegally from a little town outside Naples. His alien file has been presented to me.

Click here to learn about Discovering the Civil War, which opened at the Archives Friday.